Latest Contact Center Best Practices

As customer service continues to overtake price and product as a brand’s key differentiator, businesses are increasingly seeking out ways to help streamline and optimize every aspect of the customer experience, from queue management and hold times, to interactions and follow-ups. But for many of today’s leading contact centers, there is very little control over when a call is answered and by whom, and often no efficient or effective means of identifying callers prior to speaking with them. Consider this—while 59% of calls require identity verification, only 3% are handled entirely through automated processes (ContactBabel). For most, basic and static IVR menus(i.e. “press 1 for sales, press 2 for support”) are the primary means of differentiating callers and attempting to route them to the appropriate department, with little to no account for preexisting customer data or prior interactions.

Despite the fact that speed is consistently ranked the number one factor to a great customer experience, and alternative channels tend to offer more immediate assistance than phone (self-service, chat, etc.), 79% consumers still prefer voice based service. And while none would argue against the fact that consumers prefer to be helped quickly when seeking support via the telephone, recent studies suggest they don’t mind waiting on-hold as much as many would assume. In fact, according to a recent PH Media poll of over 2,000 Americans, more than 55% of callers were okay with waiting on hold for more than a minute. The results varied based on region, and can be broken down as follows: